facebook ads Archives - Bee Digital

What does iOS15 mean for your marketing machine?

Bryan Plumb — Wed, 22 Sep 2021 15:09:05 +0000

Hello everyone! It’s Bryan from Bee Digital Marketing Ltd… and I come bearing news.

iOS15 has launched… and that is important to those of you working in the education sector.

You may be asking “Apple, why are you doing this?” I thought so too. Then I thought more about it, and sat down to record this quick video to help explain:

What the new email privacy update actually means (minus the jargon).
How email pixels are about to become massively flawed.
Why you must ignore email open rates and spikes. (It’s pretty pointless now).
Why current email models are poor… and remembering what the point of sending an email really is.
What you need to focus on instead. (It’s not open rates. Stop looking at open rates!)

Good luck!

The post What does iOS15 mean for your marketing machine? appeared first on Bee Digital.

Don’t just make Facebook ads – create YouTube ads too!

Ant Smith — Tue, 09 Feb 2021 08:06:59 +0000

Why are paid ads on Facebook the go-to for marketers?

Well, with Facebook advertising, you can reach your exact audience.

This is a big benefit – huge – that makes Facebook advertising one of the most targeted ways for businesses to engage with an audience they know.

You can target specific locations, ages, interests, behaviours and more,

Here are some Facebook Revenue and Usage Statistics (2020) courtesy of Business of Apps that would explain why:

2.45 billion monthly active Facebook users registered as of Q3 2019 – making it the world’s biggest social media platform
90 million business pages are on Facebook
140 million businesses use Facebook every month
65% of users use their account to view photos, 57% to share content with users’ networks, and 46% to watch videos

So, why do something else, you ask?

According to Oberlo and ThinkwithGoogle, there are some very good reasons to branch out with YouTube:

2 billion people use YouTube worldwide
62% of businesses use YouTube as a channel to post video content
1 billion hours of video are watched on YouTube every day
90% of people say they discover new products or services on YouTube
Almost 8/10 marketers consider YouTube to be the most effective video marketing platform

So, the real question should be: is relying on Facebook enough?

4 Reasons why you should YouTube it too…

Emotional and creative connections

There are so many ways you can be creative and provoke an emotional connection with video.

Think about how emotional you get with the John Lewis Christmas advert and any Pixar movie.

This can be achieved through animation or real-life shots/images with happy people using your product (or something related to it, like a laptop or mobile device), an actor/ spokesperson with an engaging voice, and the soundtrack.

All of these elements combined will elicit emotions to simulate the end-user experience. Plus, the human brain processes visuals 60,000 times faster than text.

Easy to reach your target audience

You can target audiences based on gender, age, location, interests, and more – just like Facebook.

Video ads can be targeted to reach:

Affinity audiences (people with a strong interest in topics related to your product or service to promote brand awareness),
Custom affinity audiences (audiences tailored more to your brand)
In-market audiences (people searching for and actively considering buying a product or service like yours)

You can also target using relevant keywords, topics and placements – the latter being YouTube channels for your ad to appear at the beginning to reach that audience too.

Retargeting and remarketing opportunities

By connecting your YouTube account to your Google Ads account, you can retarget people who have subscribed to your channel or seen/ liked/ engaged with your videos or ads.

Because of their active interest, you can easily set up remarketing campaigns with personalised content and ads to drive conversions.

Make your campaign mobile-friendly

Optimise your pages for mobile use because more than 70% of YouTube watch times come from mobile devices.

Google prioritises paid ads with links that have been optimised for mobile use too.

With Google Ads, you can also target users who view your ad via mobile devices to improve engagement metrics like conversions, with a bidding strategy in place.

3 Tips to get started with video adverts

We get that not everyone has the knowledge or expertise when it comes to creating a video ad.

What makes the most engaging ad? Here’s how to get those creative juices flowing…

Write a script → Start by brainstorming ideas with the campaign in mind. Who is the audience? What do you want the viewer to do? What is the campaign message? With these answers, you can write a short script. Depending on your ad type (skippable or non-skippable), your ad should ideally be 15-20-seconds… if you think about an average person’s attention span. If you’re including a spokesperson or voice-over – read it aloud and time yourself to gauge an accurate length. Remember those emotive words for ad headlines and any words in your script.
Outsource creators and consultants → If you don’t have an in-house video animator – you can find a freelancer to suit your budget from sites like Fiverr or Upwork. Simply provide them with your specifications, script, assets (images, links, audio, etc.) and NDA, then agree to a deadline. Consider outsourcing consultants who specialise in social media marketing to help get you started too.
Upload and link to Google Ads → When your video is ready, upload it to your YouTube channel (not got one? It’s easy to set up). Think about your video headline, description and tags – these will help you to rank higher for SEO. Then it’s simple to link to your Google Ads account to manage your YouTube campaign. Don’t forget to UTM any links so you can track clicks via Google Analytics Goals.

YouTube ads are an investment…

As a rule of thumb, it takes 3-6 months to see the benefits of video campaigns… which is great for building your brand or product awareness.

Isn’t that a long time to wait for results compared to Facebook ads?

It might sound that way at first… but if you have a new YouTube account or product/ service, you’ll need this time to establish yourself with a YouTube audience.

This means including video ad campaigns at the start of your campaign strategy, which lets you monitor your metrics for longer, tweak bidding strategies based on weekly audits, and optimise your ad’s performance.

This timeframe also allows you ample time to craft a remarketing campaign, as well as create shorter ‘teaser’ ads you can release later on along your strategy timeline, with messaging and CTAs that are designed to drive conversions.

Another key thing to consider is: what are your competitors doing?

If they’re not using YouTube ads in their social media strategy, there are up to 2 billion YouTube users watching 8 billion hours of video per day, with 90% discovering new products to set yours apart from businesses who are doing the same old, same old.

With the impact of COVID-19, MarketingWeek advises brands need to “change their media, messaging and touchpoints to ensure they are reaching consumers with communications they are most interested in.

Marketers should look at how budgets can be spent most effectively to maintain a presence and key brand metrics if your ad spend does need to be reduced.

The post Don’t just make Facebook ads – create YouTube ads too! appeared first on Bee Digital.

Does facebook advertising work for marketing to teachers?

Alex Maher — Fri, 17 Jul 2020 12:35:23 +0000

You know what we’ve heard too many times? “Facebook advertising does not work!”

Sure. Sometimes that’s true.

You’ve written some Ad copy about your “cutting-edge and innovative product” and either paid to ‘boost’ the post or else chucked money at Facebook by creating an Ad that’s been (apparently) seen by every possible teacher in the UK.

And yet, you’ve had very little return on your investment.

Facebook doesn’t seem to be working for you.

Time to try Twitter… or Instagram… or LinkedIn.

And you’ll probably find the same thing happening again and again.

Social media and teachers

It’s not that social media advertising doesn’t work for teachers. Quite the opposite (as we’ve proved).

Social media advertising isn’t a dark art reserved for big commercial brands with deep pockets.

Social media advertising relies on exactly the same fundamentals of all great promotion.

Knowing your audience and capturing their attention at the right time, in the right place, with the right message.

And no one knows your audience better than you.

So how do you target them?

Targeted advertising is not new.

Think about the types of TV adverts that are shown on kids’ channels or around seasonal holidays, web ads that seemingly find you a few minutes after you searched on a website for a particular product, and more recently giant billboards that show you tailored advertising as you drive past.

And the advertising behind them gets more and more sophisticated. Dynamic Creative Optimisation, for example, allows brands to create Ad variations and interactive features that appeal to the right customers in the right place, at the right time.

While many of the targeting advertising examples I’ve given have been implemented by large consumer brands and retailers, there are definitely lessons that education brands can learn from them.

The main thing to remember is targeting advertising on social media is not some kind of dark art.

It’s applying the data you have on your target market with a very specific, creative, and authentic message.

Get it right and the people who do see your Ad will have a higher propensity to engage with your brand.

Customer avatars and clear messaging

When targeting teachers on facebook, consider not just the obvious demographics but also:

what interests teachers might have
what websites they like
what groups they’re a part of
what publications they read
what times of day they’re likely to be browsing online
when they have long periods of free time

And when it comes to messaging, try picking out just one or two problems your product or service solves rather than trying your best to cram in every single benefit for fear of missing out to competitors.

**If you want to include targeted advertising as part of your marketing strategy to schools but you’re not sure where to start, get in touch for a free growth strategy call, and we’ll help you figure out how you can get the most bang for your Ad spend.**

Here are my top 3 takeaways for targeting advertising in the education sector.

Continually update your audience profiling. Teacher habits and behaviours change all the time, so stay on top of the nuances of your specific target market so you can exploit this data. Don’t always presume you know teachers either. Try to find ways of reaching out to teachers to ask them about their challenges, pain-points and preferences. Share these customer avatars across sales, marketing and other customer facing business functions to help everyone understand your customers better.
Make sure your messaging is made up of authentic stories. Avoid terms like “cutting edge”, “innovative”, and “saves you time and money” – they’re lazy copy and mean nothing. Instead communicate how exactly your education product or service helps solve a specific problem in the life of a teacher.
Ad fatigue is a big deal. Help avoid your Ad becoming part of the noise by combining forensic-level customer insight with a big dose of creativity that sparks curiosity. As mentioned, data is an important weapon in your armoury. BUT don’t let all that number crunching and your quest for advertising ROI dull creativity. At the end of the day your Ads need ‘zing’ too.

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